Judy Garland

Need an object lesson on what the tawdriness of Hollywood can do to a person? Read a biography of Judy Garland. Multiple affairs, marriages, drug use. As with others who’ve delighted us with their music or acting talents, Judy’s private life was a mess. But that doesn’t detract from her huge talents, which rightly make her a Great American Thing.

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When you hear “Judy Garland,” do you think of the young girl who captured our hearts in The Wizard of Oz? Or the mature woman of A Star is Born? Or the emotional wreck she became shortly before she died of an overdose of barbiturates at age 47? They were all Judy, which is what makes her legacy such a complex mess.

Still, this is the woman who sang “Over the Rainbow.” She’s the one who earned Oscar nods, Grammy Awards, Golden Globes. She made such memorable movies as Meet Me in St. Louis, the Andy Hardy films with Mickey Rooney, The Harvey Girls, and Judgment at Nuremberg. She was troubled, she was brilliant – she was Judy.